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Cassette 6: Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (1978)/Transcript
This is the official transcript for the episode which can also be accessed for free at'' patreon.com/withinthewires'' ZOE: Hello, this is Zoe Tremblay, lead curator of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. Bienvenue. Welcome to our museum. This audioguide for the exhibit "Small Items/Big Picture" features assorted works by celebrated artist Claudia Atieno. Shortly before this exhibit opened to the public, news broke that her body was found, confirming her death, after five years missing. Across the art world, we are saddened to learn confirmation of Atieno’s death, but content in finally confirming what we long had suspected. Before the news, we had invited artist, art historian, and friend of Atieno, Roimata Mangakahia to orate this cassette. It would have been understandable in her grief, for Mangakahia to decline to record this audioguide after finding out the details of her colleague’s death, but Mangakahia agreed to uphold her obligation. We are blessed and pleased she could do so. The exhibit begins in the Desmarais Pavilion, second level. #TONE# ROIMATA: Claudia Atieno was one of our new world's most respected artists. Since the Great Reckoning, no one else combined skill, macroscopic vision, and subtle political rhetoric, quite like Atieno. I would like to start this audioguide by saying she will be missed. She has been missed for many years, really. But the pain is greater than before. It is real now. I didn’t think - I really didn’t think - but this is not important. My feelings are not relevant to this audioguide. We are here simply to contemplate Claudia’s work. #TONE# Painting 1: Mantis on Branch Look first at the branch. Atieno has used shades of lavender and green in the wood. Long meandering lines of light colors contrasting the dark grays of the branch itself. These lines, like two pastel rivers. I had hoped her disappearance six years ago was an attempt to revitalize her career with new ideas, greater ambitions. I was wrong. She just died. She has just been dead all this time. We all just die, I suppose. Why expect more? In her final years, Claudia had grown more artistically prolific. But as the quantity of her art increased, so did the quality of her subject matter plummet. I was with her often in what turned out to be the final years of her life. Do I wish I had known they would be her final years? Would I have changed the way I spoke to her, would I have broached different subjects? I suppose there is no way to be sure. I supposed it is pointless to relive it, over and over. I talked to her a lot. Our discussions about artistic evolution went from lively to combative in those years. She became obsessed with tiny objects and figures, finding microscopic details interesting. Searching for possible hidden meanings in the repetition and mundanity of everyday life. With the exception of the parties and happenings, which were plentiful, it a life mostly spent alone at her home in Cornwall. Her lovers, including Pavel Zubov and Cassandra Reza visited during times of celebration and merry-making. They did not live with her. I lived with her during the other times. I alone kept her from being alone. Look at the mantis' face in this painting. It is difficult to see it directly, as the insect is turned slightly away. I would like to tell you this is meaningful, and if you find meaning here, good for you. Most likely, Atieno simply painted a still insect that she saw in the garden, because she was trying to keep busy. And rather than change her position and perspective, rather than attempt to seek out meaning elsewhere, she simply painted what was in front of her. How many mantises have you seen before? What makes them interesting? #TONE# Painting 2: Rubbish number 3 This is a wastebin with paper in it. With an impasto technique, it's difficult to discern exactly what these papers are, but they appear to be standard and unbound A4 pages, we can assume they were old files or notes. A crumpled page lies behind the bin. Look closely at the crumpled paper. Can you read what it says? No. No you can’t. #TONE# Painting 3: Rubbish number 7 This is a banana peel. Looking at the Spanish floor tiles, I imagine this was painted in her kitchen. Atieno was, generally speaking, a tidy person. So I guess this is ironic. It's a banana peel. I have little else to add here. #TONE# Painting 4: Rubbish number 15 The final known painting in her rubbish collection, this is a wrapped stack of discarded newspapers along a street corner. It's clear these are The Western Europa Times, London Edition, but the text of the front page is not clear. All you can make out are the words “two hundred million” and “population,” which would suggest these were from October 1971. Atieno talked often of the days before the Great Reckoning. She was an infant when our population was nearly eradicated by the new weapons of a great war, and by the toxic air, which took almost as many lives as the god-like explosions throughout the 1920s. After the foundation of the Society, those born prior to the Reckoning were not granted indirect contact with family, but punitive action was rarely sought in those cases. Occasionally, she received letters and voice recordings from a grandmother, Renee. It’s not clear how Renee knew where her granddaughter lived, or if these letters were monitored for content. Renee was not allowed to communicate familial love or give any information about Atieno's family, dead or alive, so she simply told her granddaughter about what life was like before the Reckoning: foods they ate like wild birds or boar, detailed descriptions of robes and headdresses popular in the previous century, and even recitations of poetry she had learned in school. With the loss of so many libraries and information centers during the Reckoning, Renee wanted to convey - if not love for her last remaining grandchild - a written and oral history of facts and tales that might otherwise be lost. Look again at the painting of the stack of newspapers. Atieno is acknowledging the renewal of human life on earth in its new roles and rules. The new culture the Society has brung and will continue to bring. The power of information and its manipulation. You are one of 200 million people in the world? Does that make you special or insignificant? Is it possible to be both? Atieno was always excited about the new Renaissance. After the Reckoning, new artists with little history to direct them had to find new methods, new narratives. Art had been stilted, and interrupted for so long. It had felt like a luxury the world could ill afford. But by the early 1970s, Atieno seemed to have grown weary. In this oil painting of hopeful news, we see gray twine holding together gray pages on gray pavement. Look at the painting for a hint of colour. Find some colour. You really need to find colours. #TONE# Painting 5: Needlework This is not a painting clearly, but an actual piece of needlework, the only known example of this medium by Atieno. When I lived with her, I used needlecraft such as cross stitch and knitting to pass the time. I was never much of a reader, and painting for me was more draining that it was for Atieno. She could paint for hours without much of a break, whereas I often had to stop after 45 minutes or so to clear my head. During afternoon high tides, I would go cliff diving to refresh my body, to energize myself for the more intellectual and minimally physical tasks of painting or drawing in my notebook. The shock of cold water slapping my skin woke me to a world with no thoughts, only instincts. My muscles tensed at every leap, calmed at every splash, and my mind was full, not of thoughts, or ideas, but feathers. Atieno did not care for the thrill of a plunge into the sea. Her thrills came from challenging the rigid regulations of the Society, through her artwork. I suspect she often tried to keep in touch with her sister. I have no proof of this other than the Society’s Secretary of Trade Vishwathi Ramadoss saying this to me. Ramadoss once pointed out a childhood drawing of two girls in a garden, quietly talking, Claudia in the background watching. “That’s not Claudia’s school,” Ramadoss said. “She didn’t go there. See her sister clearly drawn.” “How would you know her sister?” I asked. Ramadoss cocked her head and smiled as if I had complimented her hair. Additionally, Atieno’s was paranoid that she was being watched closely by people. Obviously politicians like Ramadoss. But others, too. She welcomed these stateswomen, officers and agents into her home regularly, entertaining them with wine, food, music, dance, and stories of her youthful debauchery (often to the point of absurdity). Maintaining these amicable relationships alleviated any accusations cast on her of sedition or slander. Plus, as long as she kept her message abstracted in symbols and metaphor, Atieno could always claim that her painting was nothing more than a pig on a roast or a vivisected mouse, rather than a direct poke at a specific security chief or geneticist. Indeed, she did claim this. Even I cannot say for certain what her political views truly were. Needlework was a pastime I never taught Atieno. She never asked. But she would, on occasion, walk past me in the parlor or outside in the garden stitching phrases or flowers onto a linen circle. I had no idea until The Montreal Museum showed me this piece that Atieno ever took an interest in needlepoint, and I can only assume she taught herself the technique. She had no books on the subject, so it's likely she found some of my needlepoint projects and watched my movements to learn how to do it herself. I'm not sure why she never asked me directly. I’m not sure why she felt the need to take this from me. Of course, as this is Atieno, she was better than I was, taking my passive pastime and improving it to the level of fine art. In this piece, a simple arrangements of yellow carnations, she has clearly dyed segments of the thread to create a depth of color. Pay careful attention to the simple dots and marks of blues and pinks and greens in the leaves, not unlike some of the blots of color used by the impressionists. Think of a time in your life when you were outdone. #TONE# Painting 6: Housefly Flies were common at the Cornwall house in summer. They gathered on bookshelves and around edges of doors and windows. Atieno strictly kept food out of all rooms except the kitchen and parlor, which is where she entertained, but this is not where the flies gathered. Even with tightly sealed windows and doors that remained shut, the flies found their way into the home and could not escape. Atieno would often return from her visits to Africa or South America to a Cornwall home lined with dead flies, like spilled raisins, who had attempted to escape along window sills. This painting is of a living fly, along the top of a leather-bound copy of Alexandre Dumas' The Count of Monte Cristo. Atieno must have worked hard to not startle the fly away. There's no existing photograph or sketch of this fly, so either she quietly and slowly painted as a very patient fly quietly and slow sat atop one of the few remaining copies of this French masterwork, or she painted the insect in great detail from memory. Painting 7: Darkened Room This oil on canvas of an empty bedroom depicts a small, unlit room at the very top of the house. When I lived with her, this was the room I slept in. I have a closer emotional tie to this painting that you could possibly have, dear listener. I can feel those cool cotton sheets, persimmon throw, and billowy pillows under my head and across my body. Atieno tucked blankets tightly under mattresses, and the effect on the sleeping guest was not unlike a swaddled baby. Nights in Cornwall were cozy and nurturing. Surrounded by ocean, we could hear only cresting of the waves, and the occasional birds and crickets through the cracked summer windows. Daytimes could be different. While she adored throwing parties and filling the house with her eclectic collection of friends, Atieno sometimes grew tired of guests with little warning. As I stayed with her for months at a time, I found I needed to escape her judgment and chiding some afternoons. She would want to work in the kitchen or on the patio or in the living room, and my presence irritated her. She made this known with a curt "I need this area to work. Please find another place to do yours." So I would paint in the bedroom, or sketch, or knit. Sometimes I would take the boat and head back to the mainland. Go for walks in the rubble of nearby neighborhoods, searching for old photographs of families, just to see what families used to look like, wondering if my family were still alive and what it must have been like back in the time of fathers and mothers and brothers and sisters. I know the Final Generation was full of violence and tribalism - a senseless conservatism of culture and values, which lead to war - but I still revel in how similar the awful purveyors of destruction look just like us. The few photos I found during my excursions into the rubble often showed two middle-aged humans with dead-eyed smiles and proper Sunday dress standing behind two or three children equally dressed and hiding their teeth behind stiff crescent lips. Sometimes the father would have his hand firmly on his oldest boy's shoulder, holding him into place as if keeping a balloon from lifting out of gravity. The mother would sometimes have her hand on a daughter's neck, as if she were holding a glass of water and not a small child. Sometimes in the ruins of these homes, I found pieces of ceramic lamps or shreds of sofa cushions. Sometimes I found saplings or vines growing through the twisted grids of stovetop grates or out of bath pipes. It was not uncommon to find remnants of bodies too - burned or brittle, and all but unrecognizable. I suppose these findings would have made for good still life paintings, and with better foresight, I might have taken my brushes with me on these walks. But given the proliferation of destruction still uncleaned by our tiny, recovering population, I imagine every art student with an empty sketchbook has thought to capture the grisly aftermath of a global devastation. But art is often just record keeping, letting us know that an apple looked the same to Cezanne in 1895 as it does to a grocer in 1974. Or a dog in a 15th century tapestry had the same shape and size ratio to humans as one today on Saint Catherine Street right here in Montreal. When I did find photographs among the shells of former houses, I collected them in an album that I kept under Atieno's guest bed shown here in this painting. Of course, the guest room she has painted is uninhabited, ready for overnight guests, even if its pristine neatness does not exactly welcome them. In the open space next to the chest of drawers you see in her painting is where I set my easel. Mostly my relationship with Claudia was positive, friendly. She was chatty during morning and afternoon tea, and in the late evenings just before bed. But when she began to work, she disdained my presence. I have been critical of much of her work in this exhibit, and I hope the people of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts will not take offense. Claudia could create color and spectacle unlike anyone, not only on the canvas but in social settings. She was not herself a rambunctious sort, but her demeanor brought out the wild side of so many. She quietly encouraged people to let go of inhibitions, while she displayed little of the same behaviour. I always wanted more out of her work, and I hope you would have wanted the same. We now know she's dead of course, so there's not much that can be done at this point. Perhaps I should leave it be. I loved her. Like a friend. Like a lover. Like a teacher. Like the sister the Society won't let me have. The tide comes in and it goes out. You’re either there when you need to be, or you’re not. Time is impervious to critique. For all of her supposed fighting against the new Society, the Society still is. Her most minor works hang on a wall in the former country of Canada. There should be more for her. For any of us. I'm sorry. Montreal is lovely. The Museum of Fine Arts is a real gem, Claudia is lucky to have her work displayed here. Let's look at the final painting in this exhibit. #TONE# Painting 8: Guests Here Atieno depicts a party in the parlor. Look at the third guest from the right, near the upper corner. That, I believe, is me. You can also see her former lovers Pavel front and center and Chrisette, just behind Pavel. Both are holding goblets of red wine and dancing, the wine spilling carelessly into the air, eternally aloft, never reaching the floor. No musicians are shown here. Often guitarists and singers would perform next to the nonworking fireplace and the piano. She rarely had anyone playing the piano as she felt it too stuffy. Also her record player was positioned on the bookshelf, but in this painting its usual location is filled with books. She is editing her life here, I believe, as in reality she had few books. I am not sure what the guests at this party are dancing to. Based on Pavel and Chrisette's presence at the same party I was at, I place this painting as March 1972, only days before the last time I saw her. This was the last moment any of these people would see Atieno - Chrisette, Pavel, Deputy Minister of Culture Sanjay Viswanathan, the woman who headed the Childhood Detachment and Development Program for the Society, those two men who claimed to be marketing managers for the World Bank but were most definitely private investigators. I was there in Cornwall, on Claudia Atieno's last day alive. Last day seen alive. It was in March 31, 1972. I suppose there’s no way to know exactly when she died. I remember the evening clearly. I had returned from cliff diving as was to return to a painting before the party. She was in the garden behind the house. Guests were just arriving. I don’t remember this party. I remember a quiet dinner. The next day - or the day after, I can’t be sure - I left for Paris to visit friends. Or Amsterdam, was it? The Rijksmuseum. I don’t know. I can’t remember. It’s been so long. I really should know these things. It was Pavel who reported her missing to the police on April 16th. I do not know why he had come back to see her. Or why she let him It is strange to mourn someone who was never a regular presence in your life. My friendship with Claudia was characterised by long absences. We were either together entirely, sharing food and shelter, work and leisure - sharing everything, for months at a time. Or we were wholly apart, with no contact at all - neither of us being much for letter writing. I have grown used to never seeing her, these past few years when there was still hope, so why now do I feel so broken? Why does it feel like she has been pulled so suddenly out of my life when, in reality, she hasn’t been in it at all? I feel as bereft as I would if I’d been with her until yesterday. As I would if she disappeared from right in front of me. Wait - no. That’s not right. It was autumn. She went missing in autumn. I’m sure of it. Category:Transcripts